


I Used to Live Alone (Before I Knew You)

by Trixen



Category: Outlander (TV) RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-03
Updated: 2016-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-06 06:11:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8737840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trixen/pseuds/Trixen
Summary: It's Christmas Eve in New York.





	1. afternoon.

_There was a time when you let me know_  
_What's really going on below_  
_But now you never show that to me, do you?_  
_But remember when I moved in you_  
_And the holy dove was moving too_  
_And every breath we drew was Hallelujah  
_ \- Hallelujah (Jeff Buckley version)

 

The cold seems to have fingers.

 

Icy thumbs brush her eyelids. Palms thick with frost steal beneath her jacket, skitter along the hidden hollows of her ribs. Her hair - so long now that it almost tangles to her elbows - is a dark wave of wind and wet. 

 

And Caitriona welcomes it.

 

Loves the first fall of white in New York. Loves the tree branches pregnant with snow. The steam coming off coffee cups and the puffs of breath passerby leave, like constellations. 

 

Loves her anonymity.

 

Loves her own silence.

 

Loves the hot place where her heart used to be, her silly, stupid, red-raw heart. 

 

~

 

In the used bookshop, there is Christmas music playing. Something soft, something lonely. _On this winter's night with you._ Garlands of light are strung carelessly around the columns flanking the entrance.

 

She hangs up her coat on the hook by the door. Loops her scarf in a knot around one of the arms. Sticks her gloves in the pockets, not caring if they fall out or end up trampled. There’s no one here but her, after all. She can hear the owner rustling in the back. He’s left a cup of tea on the counter by the register. It brims over, little wavelets escaping the edges of the saucer.

 

Divested of her armour, she's left in jeans and knee high boots, her ivory sweater and damp hair. She puts her knuckles to her cheeks, feels the roses there, the flushes that are like burns. 

 

The books smell of leaves and people’s homes. Wood smoke and thousands of cooked dinners. Spilled wine and cigar ash. The salt of semen and tears and pressed flower petals, as thin as dreams between the pages. It is a peculiar kind of happiness, the idea of walking these aisles, opening new worlds and watching them tumble out, raging or sweet. Filled with dragons or detectives. Blood letting and frozen oceans. Beautiful, foolish girls and beautiful, foolish men. 

 

Caitriona touches the spines carefully, wandering farther into the depths, past the history and the fantasy, past the cookbooks that make her belly growl, past the romance novels (it amuses her briefly to see _Outlander_ displayed prominently - Diana would have a _fit_ ), past Oprah’s book club, down down down a long corridor until she finds what she needs. 

 

The poetry books are crammed into an alcove off the stairs that lead to the second floor. There are piles on the floor, towering skyscrapers that threaten to topple. Hands on hips, she surveys the titles, wondering what she'll bring home to her cozy flat. She has wine for later, and enough logs for a bonfire, and she picked up some food that morning from the market. Fresh pasta, cream, vodka sauce, garlic for roasting, a warm and yeasty baguette. 

 

Her mouth tastes of salt, and she licks her lips, thinking of food and ceaseless words and the flames of her fireplace, their edges almost blue with heat.

 

That colour blue; it almost hurts to think of it.

 

Caitriona's whole body seizes, and it's as if every pink, secret, vulnerable place inside of her squeezes shut, tight, tight, protection. Idiotic tears clog the back of her throat and she shakes it off, dragging the step stool over from its place behind the stairs. She wants to look at the top shelf, and sod her _memories_.

 

Worthless, now.

 

  
_Chin up, Balfe._ She finds a thick volume of Sara Teasdale, and almost crows with delight. This is perfect, so perfect. Exactly what she craves. Warm food, lots and lots of ruby wine, Eddie, the smell of clean wood burning, the smell of her Christmas tree (she had one this year because why not), perhaps a call to her sisters later. A little Damien on her iPod (Karolina had set her up with speakers earlier that year and it was magical, technology).

 

Perhaps a good cry, because also why not.

 

"Cait?"

 

_Oh._

 

She thinks for a moment that she cannot possibly have heard it, and she doesn't turn. Her knees tremble - how ridiculously cliche, but oh God it's happening - and she clutches the top shelf with freezing hands, wondering if her imagination could conjure it up so exactly right. The rough timber of it. The whisky notes. The Scots lilt.

 

That particular way he always said her name, as if it was as fresh and stinging on his tongue as copper pennies. 

 

"Cait..."

 

_Buck the fuck up, Balfe. Turn Around._

But she can't. She does speak though, because she's aware she looks like a complete numpty, standing with her back to him, in this secluded, dark corner, her legs shaking and her heart banging in her chest.

 

"What are you doing here?"

 

"Same as you, I'd expect. Book shopping."

 

"Not what I'd expect you to be doing today."

 

Sam doesn't reply right away. She can almost hear him thinking. His voice is low when he finally says what must have been flickering through his mind. "Ye heard, then?"

 

"Everyone did."

 

"Yer hair ... it's so long."

 

She's aware of how it must look, spilling in unruly waves down her back. Startling against the cream of her sweater. Like a dark river over snow. She's aware of how thin she is, how desperately devoid of all that sumptuous, polished flesh. She's aware that she looks about as far from Claire as she could get. Precious, precious anonymity. Precious, precious forgetfulness. 

 

Like a great gulp of the Pacific Ocean. 

 

_They say it has no memory._

The quote spasms through her mind like a dying bird. Finally she turns, spinning like a dime on the little step stool. He's standing just at the entrance to the poetry section. He hasn't taken off his jacket, and little snowflakes dust the collar. Though she knows he must have stopped dying his hair, there is still dark red glimmering throughout the burnished gold. Stubble roughens his face. 

 

She remembers telling him. _Red is the toughest colour to get out. Enjoy being a ginger until you perish, Heughan._

He’d stuffed a snowball down the back of her neck for that, out there in the Scottish wilds, no one to hear her shrieks but the crew and a few bemused sheep. 

 

Now, she can see his eyes are blazing — and she feels pinned, guilty. 

 

But the nonchalance is easy to come by. She’s had enough practice, and she shrugs. "Hi."

 

He regards her, as if trying to figure something out. "Hi."

 

"Fancy meeting you here."

 

"Of all the gin joints in all the world..." he says, inclining his head and giving her that ghost of a half smile. 

 

She swallows hard. "You look good."

 

"Ye look..." he pauses. "Younger."

 

Cait almost laughs. "Perhaps I learned to time travel after all."

 

"How was... the big four-oh?" he asks. "Heard from Davis that it was quite a show."

 

The step stool wobbles a bit  as her knuckles whiten on the shelf. "Was fun. I don't remember much of it to be honest."

 

"Vodka?"

 

"Quite right." 

 

"Need some help down from there?"

 

"No." She hops off herself, thanking Christ and all of his disciples that she doesn’t fall smack on her face. "Well-- I was only stopping for a moment so..."

 

"Time for a quick drink?"

 

"It's--"

 

"Christmas Eve, I ken that but."

 

"That wasn't what I was going to say."

 

He blushes a bit, and it's the sight of that -- it steadies her. Perhaps this isn’t easy for him either. 

 

"All right then, but just one. Eddie will be in a strop."

 

"She kens it's Christmas, does she?" he asks mildly, and smiles.

 

"Smart arse," Caitriona returns, and for a moment, it's like it was. 

 

They leave the shop together, Sam's palm on the small of her back. It's an unconscious gesture, and it reminds her of so many other times he's led her through doors, across sets, down grassy verges in the mud and sleet and driving rain. It reminds her of too much, and she closes her eyes, fighting the urge to cut and run.

 

"Sofia's near here..."

 

Cait nods. "Fine by me."

 

They walk in silence for a few blocks, dodging fat puddles of snow melt, anxious shoppers laden down with parcels, tourists gawking at the towering buildings and holly wreaths, the lights strung from post to post, the glittering mess of windows and the sounds - crashing, voices, thrumming traffic. 

 

Cait hugs herself briefly, looking to her side, at him there - here. In _this_ city that has had her heart for so long. In this city where she has tried - in both cowardly and valiant ways - to mend, to breathe, to _hide._

She has a little flat. It's on one of the highest floors, so that she can gaze out over the buildings, the parks, the life teeming. Eddie likes to burrow against Cait's velvet ottoman and lie on her back in front of the fire. Now that it's winter, the doves have gone from the window sills, and frost sugars the panes every morning. Cait has a vintage four poster bed that she bought from ebay, and her art is stacked in corners, along with her books and totes of her things, a black dress from Comic Con and Caitriot t-shirts and the two BAFTAs she won. Her Golden Globe is at her mother’s in Ireland. 

 

She screens most of her calls. She eats very simply. 

 

Most of her talks these days are with Eddie, her little consigliere, who listens, but seems to think her mama might be a few sandwiches short of a picnic. And now what? Now she’s supposed to chat normally with a human being? 

 

The first threads of panic tighten in her belly, but then — they turn a corner. The wine bar is tucked away, framed by flowering trees that have turned Narnia-white with the change of seasons. Caitriona walks up the steps ahead of him, conscious of the way her body moves in his presence, of every breath she takes through her ragged lungs, every aching point of her skin touching clothing, every throb of her pulse.

 

Once they're seated in a little hideaway booth by the windows, she snuggles back into the plush fabric of the enclosing walls, staring outside at the drifting snow, at the little candles dotting their table, at the menu of wines. Anywhere but in his direction. But she can feel him in her periphery, taking off his coat and scarf, hanging them up with hers.

 

The booth is akin to a little private world, and yet, suddenly she wishes they were lost in bustling crowds. Jostled and pushed, annoyed even. Perhaps it would make this all easier?

 

"Shall we get some food? I'm half starved."

 

"Mmm," she allows herself to grin. "You always say that."

 

"I'm a growing boy."

 

"You're almost forty."

 

"But not quite." He wiggles his eyebrows. "Not at your level yet, Balfe."

 

_Balfe._

"Actually, I'm a bit hungry myself," she says, ignoring the hot knot in her belly. "They have good fondue here, don't they?"

 

"Aye it's scrummy," he says absently, scanning the wine list. "Pinot noir with it? I quite fancy a red. It's too cold for anything else."

 

"Sorted," she says, trying not to remember other lunches, dinner, snatched bites between scenes. "Make sure it comes with bread and not just green things."

 

It gets a bit awkward after they order and the wine is delivered. Just for a moment, they have nothing to say, and it's so, so different to times past, when they could hardly get a word in edgewise around the other. Caitriona sips her wine. It tastes like chocolate and musk and strawberries blooming on her tongue and she savours it, savours the hot path it traces down her throat.

 

"So..." Sam breaks the silence first. He sounds hesitant, searching. "So are ye working anywhere?"

 

"Taking a gap year," she murmurs and is rewarded by his grin. “But I see you’ve been busy.”

 

“Aye, just… feeling my way.”

 

“Quite a successful way,” Cait says, tipping her glass in his direction. “I’ve been chuffed to beans watching you take on the world.”

 

Sam blushes as he is wont to do and dips his head a bit. “I had thought about calling ye but—“

 

“You don’t—“

 

“But I …” he speaks over her and shakes his head, avoiding her eyes. “I felt like maybe… ye didn’t really want me to? After what happened at the wrap party, I just…”

 

Will her throat ever stop hurting? “We got much too pissed that night.”

 

“Absolutely trollied,” he agrees. “But— that wasn’t why-“

 

“That's … moot point, wouldn’t you say?” she says tightly. “Given the circumstances.”

 

“Caitriona—“

 

“Fondue!” she exclaims, relieved.

 

Feels silly for it, but oh god, she’s never been so happy to see a bowl of hot cheese in her life. Which is saying something, because cheese has always been quite dear to her heart. She fusses with the plate after the server has left it alongside the fondue pot; rearranging the accompaniments. The hot, char-grilled slices of bread. Thick tortilla chips, studded with salt. Emerald green broccolini, apple wedges, asparagus and other things that look disgustingly healthy. 

 

  
_Much_ too healthy for Christmas Eve.

 

“Sod these weeds, huh?”

 

His mouth quirks but he doesn’t smile. “Cait, ye don’t want to talk about anything real, do ye?”

 

She registers the way his accent has thickened with his mood, and thinks of oncoming storms, skies blackening, clouds like purplish wounds.

 

And she says what she doesn’t really want to say. “Perhaps that’s why…. perhaps that’s why I didn’t want you to call. It just got a bit too much, Sam.” 

 

He visibly flinches when she says his name. Sticks some bread into the cheese. Dunks it actually, without using one of the spears they’ve been given. When he takes a bite and chews, his brow furrows and he seems to be concentrating on the motions of eating. He drinks his wine, the pale column of his throat working as he swallows. 

 

Everything, _everything_ in her resounds, sore from desire. 

 

“So I _was_ right, then.”

 

“About?”

 

“About ye giving me the freeze out.” He tempers this with a slight grin, but his voice is low and rough. “I thought so but it seemed so unlike you, is all.”

 

It’s _her_ turn to flinch. “Not usually petty, am I.”

 

“Was it you being petty then? Or was it something else?”

 

“Something else?”

 

Sam shrugs. “I kent at the time you weren’t very keen on what I said to ye or what happened. So it seemed only right that ye would avoid me, but over a year seems a wee bit excessive.”

 

Caitriona takes a cue from him and sticks a tortilla chip into the clouds of pillowy cheese. It is hot and delicious, just as she remembered it, with notes of gruyere, fontina, cheddar, and a touch of gorgonzola. Perfectly salty and garlicky. If she could, she’d put her head down and wallow in it; anything to avoid answering his questions or looking directly into his eyes. 

 

They’re even more painfully beautiful than they are in her dreams, and she _can’t_ bear it, really can’t.

 

“I was being a coward, you can say it.” She laughs a little, pushing back the weight of her hair with her free hand. “After we kissed I just felt —“ her voice breaks, “ _disassembled_.” 

 

“ _Why_ , Cait?”

 

His palm covers hers. Stills its shaking, and she looks up, surprised by the touch, and by the heat of his skin. His eyes are blazing again, and she can almost _feel_ the way they implore her for the truth. Always, always the truth. He has always wanted so much from her, and yet— not wanted anything at all.

 

All those blondes.

 

“Because it made me a dirty cheater, Heughan,” she answers lightly. Moves her fingers away from his. “I gave back as good as I got, if you remember.”

 

“Oh, I remember.”

 

Her belly hurts at _that_ , at the roughness in his voice. 

 

He says, “Yer not still… together then?”

 

“We broke up when I moved back.” 

 

“I’m sorry.”

 

“Thank you.”

 

“He seemed a good bloke. Never really saw you two _together_ but-“

 

“It turns out neither did we,” Cait jokes. “One month of solid togetherness and we were both running for the hills. Perhaps there’s something to be said for long distance relationships after all.”

 

“Ye think so?” Sam pauses and their gazes lock. “I can think of a few people I’ve spent twenty-four days with and still wanted more at the end of it.”

 

She will _not_ respond to that. She _will not._ Instead, she takes a long drink of wine and looks about the restaurant, still teeming on the day before Christmas. Filled to the brim with laughing couples, families saying toasts or grace, raucous groups of mates. The living embodiments of _eat, drink and be merry_. 

 

“Funny how busy it still is.”

 

If he notes the abrupt change of subject, he decides not to comment. 

 

“I’m just always amazed at how Manhattan never stops,” Cait continues. “Even after years here. Remember that one in Glasgow—“

 

“When we were snow bound and nothing bloody well opened for days?”

 

“Yes,” she giggles. “You called me and said you would actually murder someone for a bacon butty.”

 

He chuckles. “So ye made me that… spaghetti.”

 

“It was _good_ ,” she says tartly. “It was carbonara.”

 

“Without bacon.”

 

“It had tempeh bacon,” Caitriona replies. “Which you didn’t even _know_ about till I told your sorry arse so—“

 

“I felt tricked, tis true.”

 

“By how damn delicious it was.”

 

“It might’ve been passable,” Sam responds, sipping his wine. He leans back and shrugs expansively. “I believe I ate most of it, didn’t I?”

 

“Asked for seconds and cleaned your plate both times, Heughan.”

 

“Now that’s just a crock of shite.”

 

“The plates had tongue marks on them for days. They had to be given counselling.”

 

He laughs out loud. “I dinna recall _licking_ anything.”

 

“You wouldn’t, you slut.” 

 

“Just cause you’re jealous, Balfe…”

 

“Oh God,” she rolls her eyes. “As if.”

 

He chucks her chin and signals to the server for another bottle of wine. “That was a good Christmas, wasn’t it though.”

 

“Toby brought that girl—“

 

“Oh my fuck, I forgot about her—“ Sam is almost gleeful. “She wouldn’t eat anything but fruit. It was like _Notting Hill_ for christ’s sake. And Matt only had those ratty looking plums—“

 

“Shrivelled, like balls.” Cait cringes delicately. “They literally looked like testicles. And then Toby got plastered and said she had just tagged along after a one nighter and he couldn’t get shot of her.”

 

“He had the worst luck, poor sod.”

 

“Maril dried out the turkey because she drank too much and forgot about it. It was like Christmas at the Griswolds.”

 

“We watched that, didn’t we?”

 

“Y'all bet we did,” Cait says in her best American accent. “Well that was shit. Sorry.”

 

“Why don’t I remember—“

 

“You had already passed out, darling,” she says, giggling again. “Too much homemade egg nog.”

 

“Ahhhhh,” he sighs and shudders. “Right…"

 

“Terry made it. I actually think she might have been trying to kill us.”

 

“It’s all coming back to me, Balfe. Didn’t you make-“

 

“Mince pies. _Yes,_ you dickhead. You ate them all, you should remember better than anyone.”

 

“I dimly recall chucking them all back up the next day...“

 

Cait clocks him in the shoulder as he laughs, her face twisting with disgust. “Thanks for the mental image, christ —“

 

“You’re so welcome, Miz Balfe,” he replies in his own version of an American accent, an inexplicable mix of New Yorker and Texan. He pours them both some more wine, his cheeks flushed from laughter, and she’s stricken suddenly - looking at him so happy. So like she remembers him.

 

“For auld lang syne,” she says quietly, lifting her glass in a toast.

 

Sam smiles at her, fully and unreservedly. And still she can see the sadness in his eyes, mirroring her own. Their glasses clink, little chimes in the clamour of the restaurant. He nods, just once.

 

“For auld lang syne,” he says, and they both drink.

 

~

 

“I’ll walk ye home.”

 

Outside, the wind’s picked up, and thick ribbons of snow flow past them, like frozen rivers in the air. The sky is black as jet, diamond-studded with thousands, millions of burning stars. An endless ocean of night. In the distance, Cait hears the throatiness of church bells, and all around them, windows are filled with wreaths, holly, pine trees, poinsettias, ribbons blood-red against glass.

 

“No need of that, really,” she protests, bundling up. Her scarf she winds around her neck multiple times, pulling on her gloves with the help of her teeth. “It’s close by and I’m sure you have plans—“

 

“Not just yet.” He tugs his hat on over the pinked tips of his ears and buttons his coat. “No arguments, Cait.”

 

“If you’re sure. I wouldn’t want to impose."

 

He follows her as they begin to walk toward the west, his hand at the small of her back. He sounds annoyed. “How could _you_ possibly impose?”

 

“Well—“

 

“Haven’t we been through enough together that my walking ye home is just understood?”

 

Her voice is quiet, measured. And yet it seems to echo, like the cry of a wolf in a frozen forest. 

 

“Not the night before your wedding."


	2. evening.

 

The words sit in the air for a moment, crystallizing like frost before vanishing with the wind. Caitriona wants to tell him that she couldn’t _not_ say it, couldn’t _not_ vocalize it.

 

If she hadn’t, she might have tricked herself into forgetting.

 

Sam takes a breath, a small one. He spins her to face him, his hand on the bone of her elbow, his thumb pressing against her skin. His smile is faintly bitter, but it’s there.

 

 “That’s tomorrow. This is now.”

 

She shrugs. God, the effort it takes to lift her shoulders. “It’s still happening.”

 

“Aye.”

 

They resume their path toward her apartment, side by side, down the icy sidewalk. Every time they reach a puddle or a drift of snow, Sam walks ahead and then reaches out with his palm, helping her, steadying her. It’s all Cait can do not to tear through the swell of her bottom lip with her teeth, bite down as hard as she can to make herself not… _forget._

 

Christ, the banging of her heart, like a door knocker in her chest. 

 

“Did my invite get lost in the post?"

 

He clears his throat. “Did ye want one?”

 

“Should I?”

 

“A bit awkward, I would have thought.” Sam pauses and looks up, away. “Besides, we only invited witnesses.”

 

_We._

Caitriona is almost scientifically interested in how it feels like a hole has opened up inside of her. Just from such a small, small word. He says it so casually, but she can see beneath, to the dragons and fire and blood. She thinks of the books in that shop, waiting to spill their worlds like intestines.

 

She thinks of how her evening was supposed to go. She thinks of how she had almost tricked herself into the kind of pretending that might be false, but still soothes. She thinks of the Pacific again, of all of that beautiful blue forgetfulness.

 

“Why only witnesses?” she finally asks, conscious that she needs to speak at some point or he’s going to guess the boiling beneath the silence.

 

“My choice,” Sam says tersely. “Didn’t feel the need to make a fuss.”

 

“So romantic, Heughan.”

 

“I dinna really want to talk about this.”

 

Neither does she, but she can’t help it. “It’s your _wedding_ … it should be—“

 

“ _What_ , Caitriona?”

 

Oh. There’s danger this way, she can feel it. He’s on the edge of something, like an avalanche taking its first breath of snow.  

 

So, she does what she does best. She acts. 

 

“Calm your tits, would you.” She knocks his arm with hers. “I was just trying to be a mate.”

 

He chuckles and the moment is split down the middle. “Were ye now. I think ye were just being nosy.”

 

“Fair play. Are you wearing a kilt?”

 

“Christ, fuck off.”

 

She’s giggling now. “Get those buns out. The occasion demands it.”

 

“Normally ye get naked _after_ the ceremony, Balfe.”

 

“Don’t make me vomit.”

“Ye’ve seen me without my kit off plenty of times. Don’t remember any nausea then.”

 

“You were _Jamie_ ,” she says primly. “It’s a different thing.”

 

“Look at you all virginal."

 

“To be honest, I think it grew back."

 

He laughs out loud and chucks her chin. “Och, as if. As I recall, ye were quite the hot little property back in the day.”

 

“Not anymore,” she says, wiping away a fake tear. “It’s been a lonely few months…”

 

It’s so _easy_ , this. Bantering, acting like toddlers after a sugar binge. When they reach her building, Caitriona ignores the encroaching feeling of grief. It’s like the taste of food in her mouth, or the white noise of the city. Always there, sometimes retreating, but ever approaching, eddying, waiting. For _her._ To _get_  her. 

 

“This is me.”

 

“Ah.” He stops and looks up at the brownstone, his teeth worrying the stung fullness of his lower lip. “Well?”

 

“Well… I—“ she pauses and then rushes on, full-tilt. “I hope you have a wonderful day tomorrow and that it—"

 

“I can’t see Eddie?”

 

She’s stumped, and irritated and unutterably … _radiant_ that he doesn’t want to say goodbye (not yet not yet) and she feels herself blush. _Oh God, get a hold of your-fucking-self, Balfe._ But it’s there, hot and sure and blooming in her face. From the sweet and bitter wind, from seeing him again after so many long months, from the idea of him in her tiny flat. 

 

“Only if you build one of your fires.”

 

“Done.” He rubs his hands together. “Ye know I fancy a challenge.”

 

It turns out to be not _quite_ such a challenge, for Cait is meticulous about storing her logs and kindling in the dry space to the left of the fireplace. Everything catches like electricity, and soon the flat is filled with bright heat. He is nonetheless very pleased with himself, and spends some time pottering about with the fire, poking at it and filling it with more sticks and cracklings of paper. Eddie looks on with her usual askance, only deigning to kiss Sam once on the nose - strange, Cait thinks, for Eddie usually _loathes_ men being in her space.

 

She’d obviously missed him.

 

Caitriona keeps the lights low and brings out some candles, setting them out on the coffee table and by the windows. Sam watches her light the wicks, watches her plug in the christmas tree (all white and gold and silver, like showers of starlight), watches her as she leaves to change into leggings and a long sweater, watches her come back with wine glasses and a bottle of red from Positano. 

 

Watches her.

 

She feels edgy and hot and a bit sick, like the night before an exam or audition. Like she could climb out of her skin and it wouldn’t be enough. 

 

“Are your socks wet?”

 

“Aye but it’s naught to worry about—“

 

“Let me put them in the dryer.”

 

“Ye have a dryer?”

 

“I know, it’s a Manhattan miracle.”

 

So she puts his socks in, and his sweater - both damp with winter - and he’s left looking boyish in his t-shirt and jeans, sprawled on her couch, making noises at Eddie and sipping wine from the sun drenched coast of Italy. The kitchen is just off the living room, in a sort of alcove, and from the stove, she can see the back of his head. The colour of pale pennies.

 

She’s boiling water when he calls from the couch, “Oy! What’re ye doing?”

 

“Cooking.”

 

“We just ate.”

 

“You’re not hungry?”

 

Silence. 

 

“So what’s to eat then?” he asks wryly. 

 

“Something to go with that wine.”

 

“Just no tempeh bacon, lass, please.”

 

“Put some music on, you, and be quiet.”

 

As the pasta (brown rice shells) cooks and the sauce simmers, Cait wanders over to the window near the Christmas tree, sipping her wine and looking out over the city. Hundreds of lit windows, like hot blocks of colour, and a fat crystalline moon, perfect for reindeer to cast their shadow upon. The flat is warm and cozy, with only the candles and spitting flames for light. Eddie snuffles happily against Sam’s chest, and 

 

_oh_

 

Cait’s own heart pulses, braying for what could have been, oh what could have been.

 

She thinks it will always haunt her.

 

“Ye didn’t have to cook for me.”

 

His voice is soft and something unfurls inside of her at the sound of it. Counting Crows are playing on the speakers that Karolina so helpfully set up and now Cait wonders if she shouldn’t be furious with her friend after all. The lyrics are too much.

 

_You try to tell yourself the things you tell yourself to make yourself forget_

_I am not worried_

_“If it’s love,” she said, “then we’re gonna have to think about the consequences"_

 

And he’s still watching her; she can _feel_ it, down to the marrow of her bones, every single one of her solitary, intimate places.

 

“I like cooking for you.”

 

“Why is that, then?” he answers immediately.

 

“You’re a gannet.”

 

“Ha bloody ha.”

 

“Don’t be stroppy, it’ll be ready soon.”

 

“It’s actually Eddie who’s curious.”

 

“Ha bloody ha,” she echoes with a grin and goes to serve up their dinner. She’s not hungry, but the sheer pleasure of cooking for him and eating with him… well. 

 

“Shells with vodka cream sauce,” she says, handing him a plate. “Your favourite, I believe, Heughan.”

 

He looks suitably chastened. “And fresh parmesan. Well done you.”

 

“Mmm hmm,” she murmurs, curling up on the velvet recliner by the fire. It’s navy blue and is partner to Eddie’s favourite ottoman. Often, Cait reads here and sometimes sleeps here, lulled by the sounds of the city and the dying flames. 

 

“This is immense.”

 

“Mmm hmm,” she says again, nodding.

 

Sam shakes his head. “For christ’s sake, I admit it. You’re basically a chef, okay?”

 

“Okay.”

 

“Will ye talk again now?”

 

“About what?” Cait asks around a mouthful of sauce. Bloody hell, it _is_ good, and she was so distracted making it she almost poured rum in the pan before remembering. “Times gone by?”

 

“You’re the one who toasted to them.”

 

“Too much wine.”

 

He regards her over the rim of his glass. “And now?”

 

“Eating. No time to be slushy about all of that.”

 

“It was pretty… different though, wasn’t it? I haven’t been able to… recapture it.”

 

“Why do you think we got…”

 

“Cancelled?”

 

She swallows. “Yes. I’ve never really… it hurt so much at the time that I just wanted to … _not_ dwell.”

 

“I’ve not thought too much about it either. I ‘spose it lost some of its luster?” He shrugs and shovels more pasta into his mouth. “I dinna know. I’ve tried to figure it out but I think it just comes down to money, doesn’t it."

 

“It frustrates me,” Cait admits.

 

“It hacks me off,” Sam replies with a grin. “But four seasons was still pretty good.”

 

“Could’ve been ten.”

 

“Aye.” 

 

“I think of that, you know.” Her voice is whisper thin and she hates that she even said it, but she can’t help herself. Not in this quiet flat, with him, at Christmastime. It’s almost nine o’clock and midnight is coming quickly. “I think of all those years we could’ve had.”

 

“As Jamie and Claire, ye mean.”

 

“Well… yes.” She hadn’t, but what’s the point of telling him that now? He’ll wear a suit tomorrow and watch a woman in white gliding toward him. “So many stories. I wasn’t ready to stop _being_ her. I feel cheated.”

“Me as well.”

 

Cait puts her half-full plate on the coffee table and curls up even further into the velvet confines of the recliner. “Could you—“

 

He’s up before she can finish the sentence, bringing her the throw she’d left over the back of the couch that morning. It makes her throat catch, how he knew what she wanted before she did even, but is there any surprise left about that? All the years they spent in each other’s pockets. 

 

He spreads it over her carefully, tucking it up under her arms as she likes (so she can still hold her wine). Then he retreats, back to the couch and to Eddie. She can’t help but look at him. At his body. Still strong and lean, still roped with muscle and borne from sweat and long hikes in the brush, still so… _capable._

She remembers once knowing he could lift her up with just one arm, and that — it sent something through her, like the touch of a hand to an electrified fence. 

 

It still does. 

 

He gestures to the empty plate. “Was delicious.”

 

“That felt like a compliment,” Cait says lazily.

 

“You hear what ye want to hear, Balfe.”

 

She smiles. “Well, I’m sure you have to g—“

 

“I’m surprised ye have a tree,” he says quickly, stretching out and putting his feet up on the arm of the couch. One of his arms goes behind his head. “I’d have pegged ye for a Scrooge.”

 

“When have I _ever_ been a Scrooge? It just seemed time for… festiveness,” she says weakly, shrugging and sipping more wine.

 

 

“Mmm hmm.” He pours himself a glass almost to the brim and scratches Eddie behind her ears. She purrs, stretching beneath his fingers. Cait has to mentally shake herself because she’s feeling jealous of her _cat_ and if this isn’t the time to get a goddamn grip, she’s not sure what is. 

 

Sam continues, “Ye told me once that you thought Christmas was a sham created by Hallmark to sell more cards.”

 

“I _do_ object to the Black Friday shit,” she says. “But this time of year just…”

 

“So why’re ye alone on Christmas Eve then?”

 

The question feels a lot like a jab to the meat of her heart, and she absorbs it silently, not looking at him, at the way his t-shirt is riding up a bit so that she can see a strip of moonlit pale skin just beneath his belly button. Burnt gold hair leading down to his jeans. Her breath feels hot and thready and she struggles for a moment.

 

“Sorry. That was shit of me.”

 

Cait smiles wryly. “Not really. It’s true, isn’t it.”

 

“Is it?”

 

“Not meant for commitment, me.” 

 

“How’d ye figure?”

 

She purses her lips and wrinkles her nose all at once. Face scrunch, Sam used to call it in the old days. “The second I lived near Tony, I wanted him out of my face. I’ve been like that with all of my boyfriends. I mean, Dave touring all the time… at some point I have to just acknowledge that I’m the common denominator. I’m the one who picks these tossers. Or maybe _I’m_ the tosser..."

 

“Ye might be on to something, Balfe.” He pauses. “You’re mental, obviously.”

 

“I wish I had something to throw at you.”

 

“The wine?” 

 

“I like this wine,” Cait says huffily. “Anyway you’re the one who brought this up. Can we move on?”

 

“To what?"

 

“You should be fucking off, for one thing.”

 

“Too lazy.”

 

She feels awkward. “Don’t you have a … stag do to go to or something?”

 

“Had that already,” he says, looking away. “Right waste of time. Do ye think that drying’s done?”

 

She watches him place Eddie carefully at the end of the couch. He unfolds his long body, bounding into the little cupboard off the bathroom. Hears him opening the door, checking the clothes. She remembers kissing him at the wrap party. It’s visceral and sudden, unbidden and unwanted. She hasn’t let herself even— and the taste of him is _there_ in her mouth, as ardent and burning as fucking, as important and insistent as salt. 

 

_A dark corner. He was off his face. They were both reeling, still shocked from the cancellation and the quick, neat dismemberment of their lives. Cait was wearing a mini skirt and a t-shirt. Her nipples were hard from the cold and the drink. She was sipping whisky and he tugged her away from the group of people, murmuring that he needed to tell her something._

_“I’ve wanted —“ he stared down at her, his eyes hooded and dark, and she shook a bit, wanting to tell him to stop. Stop before he says something that can't be unsaid. That will reverberate through their already chaotic --_

_“Christ, Cait,” he breathed out and then he was putting her hands behind her back, keeping them there with one of his. Her breasts pushed against his chest and she could only stare, could only think of how wet she was, how open and wanting._

 

“Did ye put your socks in here?”

 

Caitriona starts, tumbling from the memory as if from the pages of a book. And she suddenly thinks, of the shop, of that lonely alcove stacked with poems, of him behind her with snow glittering on his hair. 

 

“Were you really shopping for used books?”

 

Sam’s body goes still. He straightens up from rummaging through the dryer, his fists clenching by his sides. When he turns, she sees that he’s flushed and he scrubs his hand over his forehead. 

 

“I think ye know I wasn’t.” He pauses and seems to think for a moment. “I saw ye on the street so I—“

 

“Followed me.” She feels light-headed and a bit sick, with excitement or desire or nerves, she can’t tell and she doesn’t _want_  to examine it, plumb it. “Why?”

 

“I wanted to see you.”

 

“Why didn’t you just say hello?”

 

“I don’t know actually.” He shrugs. “Ye looked so… _different._ Yer hair so long and I just— ye seemed so intent.”

 

“I was thinking about food.”

 

He laughs out loud, full-belly, and looks at her with something akin to affection in his eyes. “Ye think about your next meal more than most blokes I know.”

 

“Your _point_ , Heughan?”

 

“I was too nervous to talk to you,” he says in a rush. “Okay? Jesus, ye can really strip a guy to the bone.”

 

“Nervous of me?”

 

“Aye.”

 

“We spent years finishing each other’s sentences and you’re _nervous_ to…”

 

He leans one hip against the back of the couch and crosses his arms. “How’d ye think I would feel, given you’ve not said shit to me since we wrapped? 

 

“I didn’t know _what_ to say—“

 

“'Hi Sam, what’s up' would be a start.”

 

Her spine goes straight and her gaze narrows. “Is that all it meant to you? Because I was … I couldn’t just _talk_ to you after that.”

 

“It was just a kiss.”

 

The hot stab of anger hits her unawares and she swallows it back. “Fuck you.”

 

His mouth twists. “I really dinna ken what I’m doing here. I should go.”

 

“Since I didn’t invite you, I’m not sure either.”

 

It takes everything in her to sit still and unmoving as he takes his things from the dryer, puts on his socks and shoes, tugs on the sweater, zips up his coat, still wet from the snow they stood under together - out there, in the city, beneath the sky, beneath the stars that never seemed to sleep, the stars that fell, the stars that had died millenia before, forgotten like petals pressed between the pages of a book.

 

The wine is like salt in her mouth and she thinks she is tasting the tears that will come later. He doesn’t look at her until he’s standing in front of the door. He turns back slightly, his face in shadow.

 

“Merry Christmas, Balfe.”

 

Then the door closes. She can see the impression he left on the couch, and Eddie looks befuddled, licking her paws and staring at the middle distance. His plate rests on the coffee table next to hers; just touching. Wine glass that has the imprint of his mouth. 

 

She wants to press her own lips there, touch her tongue out, taste what remains. 


	3. night.

 

It is exactly twenty-three minutes before she gets up from the chair. 

 

Caitriona stares at the plates for a moment, before picking them up, walking into the kitchen and dropping them like bombs into the sink. Eddie looks up curiously at the sound. Cracking, like thunder. 

 

The pasta sauce, bloodlike against ceramic. The Christmas lights, shimmering. The volatile clamouring of the city, just outside. She picks up the bottle of wine, drinking straight from it. Remembers when she was in Amalfi, tanned and thickened from good food and good company. Replete from sex and spaghetti vongole and dancing beneath the hot moonlight.

 

Now she’s cold, thin, not Claire. 

 

Not _Cait,_ either, really. 

 

It’s the grief, isn’t it? Always there, like a hungry animal in the woods.

 

_Sam, lying sprawled on the couch, belly-full from food she’d cooked him, drinking from her wine glass, Eddie curled up like a cinnamon bun against his chest. The firelight reflecting in his eyes, and he smiles at her, says her name._

 

And then, just like that, she is crying. 

 

Wetly and noisily, the tears rushing with the sort of violence they haven’t done in years. She clutches the edges of the sink, shaking her head, gulping and listening to the _whoop whoop whoop_ of her breaths, reverberating through her body, trying to escape. Thinks she could probably cry enough to fill this room, this flat, a pale ocean.

 

“Buck the fuck up, Balfe,” she gasps out, wanting to slap herself. 

 

It works. Slowly, slowly, the tears cease their shuddering, their insistence. She straightens up and walks over to the mirror in the hallway. Her cheeks are flushed pink, splotchy. Her hair is a mess. Her eyes shot through with ribbons of red. And yet, she thinks she might look more alive than she has in— bloody _ages_ and that, she decides, is pathetic.

 

But maybe it’s like her Mum says. _A good cry lets the wild out._

 

A knock. 

 

Three soft ones actually. _Tap, tap, tap_. 

 

Cait starts a bit, looking toward the door. All around it is the glow from the outside lights in the hallway. 

 

She wonders if she should answer, if she should really risk opening it, letting the wild back in.

 

She’s never been smart. A few steps, and she’s turning the knob. 

 

Caitriona stares at Sam. He has one arm up, and his hand is clenching the frame above their heads. He smells of the cold, of fresh, clean sweat, of sandalwood and whisky. And he’s — he’s reaching up with his other hand, hovering just inches from her face.

 

“Why are ye crying?”

 

She lifts her chin. “I think you know.”

 

“Aye, I do.” His voice is low, rough. 

 

His palm doesn’t touch her cheek. Instead, he curls it around her waist, around the bowl curve of her lower back, and tugs her toward him. Cait knows she should resist, knows that this way is danger, but god, she’s so tired — so _exhausted_ \- from fighting this.

 

Fighting this for years, eons, epochs. 

 

She grasps his t-shirt, pulls him inside. The door shuts behind them and they are there, in the hushed half-light of her hall, standing close,  _just_ touching. The aching tips of her breasts brush against his chest and Caitriona wants to moan, cry out, like a half-starved creature — this is too much, too much — and he rubs his nose against hers, so delicate, a question.

 

“ _Please…_ ” he whispers.

 

She answers him, tipping her face up - infinitesimally - and —

 

His mouth. 

 

Her upper lip presses between his, and they both breathe like that for a moment, not moving, not speaking. He makes a choked sound in his throat and she suddenly realizes they are both crying. His tears hurt her mouth and she can’t help but let out a little sob, clutching him, grappling with his jacket and scarf. They are cold, as if touched by snow clouds and migrating glaciers. 

 

His hands are in her hair, cupping the back of her head, bringing her ever closer. She feels so hungry, desperate, and they are kissing fully now, mouths, teeth, tongues. She hasn’t tasted him for over a year and it’s as addictive as wine, as sex, as _la petite morte._  How could she have gone so long without kissing him? 

 

Even if it was pretend?

 

Even if it never really was?

 

“Caitriona,” he grits out, pulling off her sweater in one movement to bare her breasts. 

 

She moans at the suddenness of it, the cold buttons and zipper against her skin, the snowflakes, the frost. His hands are so big they almost cover the hot expanse of her back, and she shivers, making short work of his clothes. Unwinding the scarf, pulling off his coat, his sweater, his t-shirt. It’s earlier when he was dressing, but in reverse. And the thought of that moment - when he walked out of the flat - it makes everything in her clutch with panic, because she _knows_ now.

 

Her palms are greedy against his chest, feeling him, and his nose bumps against her shoulder as he kisses her, the dip at her throat, where it hollows out. He licks the dime-sized sweat there, licks her saltiness off her skin, drags his tongue over her throat, up to her lips. Cait's too quick for him, kneeling down and pushing him back against the wall. She looks up, staring directly into his eyes.

 

She wants him to _know_ her in this moment.

 

She wants to burn it into him, brand him, fucking _carve_ it into the geography of his body so that he'll never forget.

 

His gaze never leaves hers. Not as she's undoing his belt. Not as she's pulling it from around his waist, loop after loop. Not as she's unzipping his jeans, pushing them down, down, down. Not as he's stepping from them, leaning down to tug off his socks and his boxer briefs. When he straightens back up, his cock brushes her cheek. It is hot, thick. 

 

"Are you sure--"

 

She cuts him off by kissing just the tip. "Yes."

 

"God, I've dreamt of seeing ye this way," Sam says, his voice guttural. "Open your mouth for me, Cait."

 

She does, and he feeds his cock between her lips, over her tongue. His head dips back and he groans quietly as she takes him fully, sucking and drinking him down until her face is pressed against his pubic hair and she can taste every inch, until he's _all_ she can taste.

 

She's drunk on it, on this, and she works him like she's always known she could, with her wet hands and wet mouth, unreservedly, hungrily, letting him slide over her tongue, teasing the heaviness of his balls. Her cheeks hollow out as she sucks him, looking up as she does (knowing without knowing that he likes to watch) and finds those blazing eyes, the darkness in them, the anger and guilt and desire.

 

He drags her up with his strong hands, yanking her against him so that his cock rubs against her belly. He nuzzles her nose with his. "I dinna want to cum just yet, Balfe."

 

She laughs, almost giddy. "Well as you're not sixteen, I'd have thought you could last a bit longer..."

 

"Around you?" he shakes his head and kisses her again. "I've waited for this."

 

"Me too," she whispers, her voice breaking on the second word. Just a hitch, but he hears it, and he wraps his arms around her fully, gathering her close, close. His lips are flush with hers, and they kiss like that for a moment, just lost in it, nothing but harsh breaths and blushes and the taste of each other, the wine, the sun blushed tomatoes from his favourite pasta. 

 

It's Sam's turn to press her against the wall, his hands moving down, underneath her leggings, cupping her ass. She aches to get closer to him, wishes that it almost hurt, wishes that she could climb inside. He moves his thigh between hers, rubbing teasingly, letting her feel the muscles of his thigh against her clit. Cait whimpers, her hips grinding a little. His thigh is so impossibly hard and strong, and her belly tightens as she rocks back and forth, imagining his cock inside of her, plumbing her very depths, ravaging her.

 

"Sam..." she whispers, mindless. "Please..."

 

"What, babe?" he murmurs, biting her lower lip. "What is it?"

 

"It's not enough."

 

"I like feeling ye ride me," he says against her ear, nipping the lobe. He sucks to allay the sting. "I like knowing how wet ye are right now. It's soaking through these leggings."

 

"Stop teasing me," she says, her hands all over him. His back, his chest, the nape of his neck where his hair is so very soft, curled. 

She reaches back, fumbling for the doorknob. Her room is hushed and slightly cool, immune to the heat of the fireplace. He gives her a little push, sending her onto the bed. 

 

"I want these off." His fingers unroll her leggings and Cait stares at him, up on her elbows, watching him lick his own lips as she's revealed, piece by piece. Her legs fall open and she thinks how glistening she must be, glistening pink. Thinks of him seeing her like this, completely bare, completely _her._ With no costumes or cameramen or make-up.

 

"Christ, I never knew--" his voice is almost unrecognizable. 

 

"Come here," she says unsteadily.

 

"Not just yet. I want to taste you."

 

She can't speak, actually _can't._ The words would be gibberish, gasps and sighs. The cover is soft beneath her back, and when she turns her head, she can snow falling just beyond the glass. And Sam's mouth is on the wings of her collarbones, tracing the bones with his tongue. He follows the pulse of her heart, sucking there for a moment, drawing each beat inside of himself. His hands rest on her ribs, the twin points of her waist. 

 

Her breasts are like worlds to him, and he explores every one. His tongue seems to touch all the inches of her skin until she is wet and shining from him, glowing, her nipples begging, hard beyond measure, beyond anything she can remember. She wants to cry out for him to please, _please,_ and then he does, drawing first one into his mouth, and then pushing her breasts together, sucking and pulling, tugging, tugging, until it's like fire.

 

Unbearable.

 

She thinks she could come just from this. From the endless torture and tease of his tongue and teeth on her nipples, sucking them to a point beyond pleasure. Almost pain, but _not_ \-- 

 

"Ye like this," he whispers, running his hands down to her hips. She bucks beneath him, mindless iterations of her maddening desire. Her nipples throb, distended and hurting. She tries to draw him back down, wanting more-- more of this aching, more until it finally consumes her.

 

But he pulls back. "No, Caitriona. I'm going to make you scream for me."

 

And he means it, she finds. He hooks his arms beneath her thighs so that his palms rest on her belly. He presses there as he slowly, thoroughly licks her, massaging her flesh and building the pressure until she feels as if all of the blood in her body is concentrated there, with his hands and his tongue. Everything in her is there, with him, constructing something that feels a bit like a hot, sparking explosive. Something bigger than her, bigger than even the years she's waited.

 

As he - _and oh God it's Sam -_ shares with her with the secrets of his mouth, she thinks that if they kissed now, they'd both taste of each other. They’d smell of each other. Of the places no one ever sees; like the hidden pages of a book, their nightmares and dragons, mountains and sea kings and dream kings, all the times they’ve caused each other’s tectonic plates to shift, their worlds to shift on their axis’, all the times they denied, denied, denied, denied, the blood from that, the endless keening _want._

  
_God,_ she’s swollen and crazy, feeling him tugging at her, engorging her flesh and holding her legs apart with strong fingers. She’ll have bruises tomorrow. Ten perfect purple marks to show of this moment. She can’t keep her hands out of his hair and then he moves up just a little, and his mouth closes over her clit. 

 

He’s been teasing her until —— and she _does_ scream, she can’t help it, the hoarse cry is wrenched from her, and he’s drawing her deep into his mouth, deep between his lips, and sucking, and sucking and- Cait feels the room slide into darkness, into the stars, as the pressure builds into a skyscraper within her, and her eyes close, everything shattering, pulsating, _breaking._

Like the plates in the sink, little bombs going off, her body going off, cracking like thunder.

 

He gives her no time, sliding up her body and cupping her face with his palms, and then he’s inside of her like lightning.

 

Caitriona opens for him, her legs around his back, her hair everywhere, her arms looping his neck, her whole body shuddering with the force of that initial thrust.

 

He’s gasping against her, not moving, just breathing, and he stares into her eyes, whispering. “I—“

 

“Shhh,” she murmurs, kissing him, her tongue tracing his lips. “Please, please—“

 

“I couldna wait— I’m sorry—“

 

“I know, I know.”

 

He makes a broken sound and kisses her, his hips beginning to move, grinding her down into the mattress. “I’ve— I’ve imagined this a million different ways.”

 

She arches her back, pushing her pussy into his pelvic bone, moaning with it. He's going so slowly, so carefully,  and she’s so sensitive, wet. “What ways?”

 

“Ye on your back, like this,” he says, low and rough. “Or with your ass in the air. Every way there is."

 

She feels light-headed, dizzy and still he continues, relentless, his words coming with the drives of his cock.

 

“I imagined your pussy against my face. Me holding ye open, forcing ye to submit to me.” 

 

Sam puts one of her legs over his right shoulder and leaves her other leg flat on the bed. The angle makes him feel impossibly big and she whimpers as he begins to work her clit with the pads of his fingers. He presses her flesh inward, so it massages her clit in time with the slams of his hips.

 

She can feel his cock moving within her, hitting every sweet, tender, tormenting spot, drawing her out until she’s shaking, grinding herself against him, desperate and wanting.

 

His chest is damp with sweat and she reaches up, rubs her hands over it and smears the salt over her breasts, her nipples.

 

His eyes go dark and he groans out loud. “Cait, I’m going to—“

 

She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t have to. His whole body moves, trying to get closer to her, and deeper, his dick like hot steel, liable to burn her, cleave her open. 

 

As he comes, he shudders against her and his fingers pull at her clit in such a way that Cait cracks open again, the orgasm quicker than before but almost unbearable in its intensity. To come _around_ him, while he is jerking and groaning against her. To hear the true sounds he makes. To feel real wetness and the hot rush of his sperm inside of her.

 

Sam collapses and then immediately rolls away, drawing her into his arms. His cheek against her forehead. His lips moving but saying nothing.

 

And she thinks geography has had its way with them both.

 

Neither will escape unmarked this night. 

 

~

 

Sam walks through with the glasses of wine, the moon at his back and Eddie purring softly at his heels. Caitriona sits, curled up beneath the covers, her feet tucked beneath her bum, Sam’s sweater covering her to the tops of her thighs.

 

He’s opened the door so that the warmth of the fire filters through, flickering in their periphery. The flames make the lights on the Christmas tree glitter like jewels, and all around them is the smell of candlelight, woodsmoke, and the sex they had, as if it inhabits its own body in the room, so present and ardent and burning like a dry forest. 

 

“Thank you,” she says, taking the glass and sipping from it, the wine glowing through her like a hot heart. She feels her own beating furiously, a trapped bird. “It’s cold; cwtch up.”

 

“You've been watching _Gavin and Stacey_ again haven't you,” he replies, climbing onto the bed and pulling the covers up over his hips. 

 

“Fair play.” She pauses, waits for Eddie to get situated. Her cat chooses (of course) to plant herself directly between them, stretching out vertically to form an ‘H’ with their bodies. “Oh well _done_ , Ed.”

 

“Does she do this with all of your boyfriends?”

 

“Never had any here.”

 

“Really?” he looks skeptical. “Ye broke up with Tony a year ago.”

 

“I told you, there hasn’t been anyone else.”

 

“I thought ye were taking the piss if I’m honest.”

 

“I never joke about sex.”

 

He chuckles awkwardly. “Especially if you’re not having any, I take it?”

 

“Thin ice, Heughan.”

 

Sam looks away and the half smile appears on his lips. “We should talk, I spose.”

 

“Isn’t that the chick’s line?”

 

“Yes. But ye haven’t asked it, so…”

 

She breathes out. “Don’t you feel guilty enough as it is without dissecting it to death?”

 

“I don’t think ye really want to know what I’m feeling right now, Caitriona.”

 

“Well I’m feeling like shit,” she whispers. “It’s your wedding day. Officially.”

 

“I ken _that.”_

“Do you? Then why are you here— why’d you come back?”

 

It’s his turn to worry his lower lip. It’s almost purple with blood; blooming with their kisses. “Because I couldn’t… not.”

 

“Oh.” She sips more wine. A reflex, nothing else. Continues, because he’s fallen silent. “I’m so sorry. I feel I— did this by sort of, appearing on the street or whatever.”

 

Sam shifts on the bed, not looking at her. “I saw ye there, on the sidewalk, looking like something from a fairy tale, with your hair all wet and wavy and looking so— _different_ — and so...? Ye looked lost in thought and all I wanted to know was what ye were thinking.” He presses his palm over his chest, his heart, forming a fist. “And it was so fucking familiar because--- God, never mind. It's all for nothing, as it turns out, aye? I’ll marry someone else and you’ll be in this flat and I just—“

 

“Sam—“

 

“And I ken it canna be anything because of what I’ve _chosen —“_ his mouth twists. “But… Caitriona, I’ve… I’ve missed you.”

 

“I missed you too,” she says, her throat roaring with pain, the tears so thick that she can barely swallow. “I’m so—“

 

“Then why didn’t ye tell me?” he asks, his voice guttural. “Why the _fuck_ did ye let me do this?”

Cait spins to face him finally, almost sloshing her wine over Eddie’s slumbering form. “Hold on a bloody minute. It’s _my_ fault you’re getting married?”

 

"Aye, it is. Do ye think I would have done this if I hadn’t—“

 

“What?”

 

“Christ, it doesn’t fucking matter, does it?”

 

"I think it does. What are you trying to say?"

 

"That it doesna matter if ye were on the street or the fucking moon," he growls out and slams his wine glass down on the side table, scrubbing his hand over his face. "I still..."

 

"It's not as if... as if... _we_ would have gotten married if today wasn't happening."

 

Sam just looks at her, and their eyes lock for the first time since they untangled themselves. He laughs, and it's a harsh sound. "Aye? Well, not sure what I'm doing here then."

 

"That's the second time you've said something like that," she replies tightly. "And yet you're here, and I didn't invite you either time."

 

"Didn't ye?"

 

"What's that supposed to mean?"

 

He gets out of the bed and pulls on his jeans. No boxer briefs. And for a moment, her mouth waters, picturing his bare flesh beneath the denim. What she'd find if she unzipped. What she _did_ find. She's distracted, fidgety and it takes her a moment.

 

"You're not leaving?"

 

"Why not? Ye clearly don't want me here." His mouth twists. "And I have a wedding to get to, don't I?"

 

Cait breathes in sharply. "You were never this cruel before."

 

"Ye didn't know me."

 

"I thought I did." 

 

"Ye thought a lot of things."

 

"Why are you so angry with me?"

 

"Why? Christ, isn't it obvious?" He's pacing. "I just laid myself _bare_ and you--"

 

"I, what?" her voice is cold, small and very, very pointed. " _I_ am not the one marrying some girl I barely know. _I_ am not the one who was so shit scared after the wrap party that I left the hotel immediately after. _I_ am not the one who dated every blonde on the eastern and western seaboards for the entirety of our … _working_ relationship."

 

"So sorry for not reading yer mind, Caitriona," he says nastily, stalking over to the window and staring out. The muscles in his back are as tense as ropes about to snap. "If I could've, perhaps I'd have done things differently. But I dinna ken what I was supposed to think, given how you reacted to that kiss. Ye'd think I'd told ye I quite fancied Terry from the way you reacted."

 

"For the last fucking time, I was _surprised._ "

 

"Really? I dinna think you were." His accent has thickened so much as to make his voice unrecognizable. "Ye keep saying that but what _I_ think is that ye weren't surprised at all. Ye've known how I felt for a long bloody time. And do ye think I'm blind? Do ye think I'm some twat who can't tell when a woman is turned on?" 

 

He spins suddenly and pins her in place with his gaze. As blue as the flames inside. As icy as the snow outside. But burning all the same. "Did ye think I couldn't _smell_ it on you?"

 

Cait flushes and feels like throwing her wine in his face. "You complete dickhead."

 

"Aye, I might be that. But I'm right, aren't I?"

 

"So what if you are? I'm not ashamed." She fixes him with her own eyes, as pale as winter fire. "And in the end, it's just sex, isn't it?"

 

He recoils. “Ye think so?”

 

“Well if it can be _just_ a kiss, I suppose it can be _just_ sex, can’t it?”

 

"I said that because I was fucked off with ye, Cait, not because--"

 

"Save it."

 

"It was never _just_ anything between us."

 

"So _that's_ why you shagged half of Scotland. I wondered."

 

Sam's mouth twists. "Aye, I see. So while you were with Tony, I was meant to wait patiently? Jerk off to thoughts of you?"

 

The image fills her mind and she looks away, almost nauseated by the insistent rush of desire. It seems she can't stop it. It seems she can't stop her own anger. The pulsing between her legs. The storms inside. 

 

"I didn't mean that you had to wait. I'm just saying..." she pauses. "I'm saying that you seem to have a propensity for declaring you want to fuck me right when there's an obstacle in the way. First Tony. Now your fiancee. It's just... convenient."

 

"Nothing about this is _convenient._ "

 

"No?"

 

"No, Caitriona. I didn't plan this."

 

She shrugs. "Sam, it's not as if I expect anything. We messed up. It happens. I really do wish you a good wedding day --"

 

"You do, do ye?"

 

"Yes."

 

He walks over to the bed, picking up his t-shirt and tugging it on. "I should go."

 

Caitriona swallows hard and looks away. "Get a cab. It's late."

 

"I will."

 

When he leaves the room without a backward glance, she feels the first flutter of gut-deep panic. Rising up, she follows him. Stupid, stupid, but she can't _not._ Outside, it's black as a crow's belly, and the snow still falls. She thinks of him there, cold, wandering in a white city.

 

"Do you need to use my phone?"

 

"I have my own."

 

He's by the kitchen, gathering his coat and scarf from where they dropped them earlier. Sam looks over at her, a half smile ghosting over his lips. It doesn't reach his eyes, not quite. "I'll call from the lobby."

 

"You don't have to--"

 

"Aye, it's best." 

 

Somehow, she can't believe this is really happening. It feels off, like a dream. Flickering at its edges, about to dissolve. She looks at him, really _looks_ and it's _Sam,_ and he's getting married today. He will say vows and promise that there will never be an end. Sam, who knew every one of her secret signals. Every one of her horrid moods and giggles and cravings. Sam, who once brought her soup when she was sick, and sang to her when she was bored and held her hand when they walked over holes made by rabbits. 

 

Sam, who always touched her back before they walked through doors. Sam, who used to stick out his tongue to make her crack up. Sam, who she called her partner because he was. She forgot who else was there, forgot about anything but the look on his face, naked and so very, very dear to her. There was only Sam, Sam, Sam and she remembers that moment, with hot lights glittering and the cameras on and she could do nothing but speak her truth, finally, finally her truth.

 

That she hasn't been alone, truly alone, since she met him.

 

"I love you."

 

He starts in shock, spinning slightly from by the door to stare at her. "What did ye say?"

 

"You heard me," Caitriona says bravely, her voice faltering, trembling. _She's_ trembling. "And I'm so sorry to say it now but I..."

 

"Yer saying that to me tonight? Of all nights?"

 

"Yes." She echoes him. "I couldn't... _not."_

Sam's eyes are so blue as to be painful, and he shakes his head slightly. He stares past her, at the fire, at the city beyond the glass. He laughs, once. It isn't tender, or happy or anything that she recognizes. She can't stop shuddering, holding her own arms, trying to hold her _self_ and then he says one thing. Says it, and opens the door.

 

Closes it, and leaves.

 

His words are like dark bells, and they resound through her long after the sun begins the slow, golden crawl back to her rightful place in the sky. 

 

"You've _ruined_ me, Caitriona."

 


	4. dawn.

_She does have bruises._

 

Caitriona holds her coffee close to her breasts, over the frantic beat of her heart. She's still wearing Sam's sweater, and she sits bare-legged on the window seat by her tree. She hasn't unplugged the Christmas lights or blown out the candles. She hasn't tended to the fire, though it still pulsates with flames, bright and unyielding as frozen rivers.

 

On the tops of her thighs where he held her still, are ten perfect blooming marks, purple as amethysts. She can’t see them unless the fabric of the sweater rides up, but she knows they are there. Ten reminders that it _happened_. Ten reminders as insistent as the smell of him on her fingers. Ten reminders that she spoke her truth; that she _was_ true. 

 

Eddie snuffles at her feet, lost in sleep. 

 

“Lucky you,” she whispers. 

 

The coffee is hot and fragrant. Swirled with cream. Caitriona stares down into its depths, wondering what Eddie dreams of. What Sam dreams of. 

 

Blondes? The awards he chased but could never quite catch? 

 

Scotland? 

 

It occurs to her then that they have never slept together. Not truly. They’ve napped. They’ve leaned against each other, bone weary, eyes closed, dozing. But they have never been in a bed, spooning, or facing away or her sprawled across his chest or his face against the nook of her neck — they’ve never fallen asleep together and had it last through the dark night till morning. 

 

Caitriona pictures him here in the flat, beneath the covers. One arm behind his head, elbow bent. His chest bare. She thinks he would sleep naked and would _smell_ naked. As clean and sharp as salt. Cait closes her eyes, imagining his nighttime wanderings, tangled like threads above her head. 

 

One is the colour of mist and she tugs on it, spooling it down until showers of rain descend on her head. He is dreaming of mountains, of trekking in boots and a fleece, his hair rustled by winds. He is dreaming of the wild barrens of Scotland, where the moorhens roost and the rolling green seems to go beyond the horizon, into space and farther still. The smells of woodsmoke and animals, the smells of sweat and his own exertions, the exhilaration and burning breaths.

 

Reaching every summit, his own personal Everests, every one something to file away, a memory and a triumph, like trophies. Conquering his own land.  

 

Another tangled thread. The colour of forests. She pulls, unraveling it from the others, and sees that he is dreaming of work. The kilt feels good against his thighs. For once, the sun splits the clouds, and she is curled up at his side, reading her ink-smudged script and taking swallows of coffee like someone is about to yank the cup from her fingers. He looks down, at the curve of her cheek, at her eyelashes, at the way her lips move unconsciously as she reads. 

 

Her hair falls across his shoulder, and he inhales the scent of poppies, wondering when he has ever felt so happy.

 

One more thread catches her eye. It shifts, changing colour. Wine-blue, winking like sapphires, transfiguring to that pureness of twilight and she cannot help but twist it about her finger. It resists, stubborn and electric, but she keeps at it, until finally, there it is, surrounding her like canyons, and he is dreaming of her.

 

Dreaming of the way she laughs at him, at his jokes, the noises he makes with his mouth, his adolescence. She can't help it, those full throated laughs, like birds rising in the air, their wings beating the very surface of it, and she laughs and laughs, giggles as endless as bells chiming. He dreams of the way they are at read-throughs, unable to keep their composure. Unable to stop themselves. Poking each other, flicking water.

 

He dreams of her mouth, of her swollen lower lip, of the way her chin quivers when Claire weeps. He dreams of the bowl curve of her lower back. He dreams of her peanut butter toast. The way she shops online, single-minded and aggressive. The way she studies menus but almost always has the same thing: hot goat cheese salad and a glass of icy Sancerre. He dreams of the way he needles her and teases her, studies her and drinks with her, dances with her and carefully does not touch her.

 

He dreams of touching her.

 

Caitriona wakes with a start as Eddie scratches her in sleep, right across her foot. A hot slice and four small ribbons of blood. 

 

"Jesus Christ, Ed," she yelps, still drowsy, still lost in those woods of her mind. Her body aches from her prone position on the window seat, and the coffee cup rests precariously on one of her thighs. On the whole, she thinks this was a better way to wake up than a lapful of steaming liquid.

 

Unwrapping herself from the limbs of her unrepentant (and still snoring) cat, she hobbles into the kitchen, dumping her coffee and considering going to bed for the next week. Or year.

 

Outside, the city is blanketed in diamonds. It's just gone six o'clock and the snow still falls, thick and unrelenting.

 

_She will not cry._

_She will not._

Bed, yes. Time for bed.

But she can’t go into the room where they fucked, she just can’t. The throw is still on the back of the couch. She curls up at one end, beneath the heavy coverlet. The room is dark and as the fire smolders, the sound of the sparks is oddly comforting. Outside, the wind howls, and soon, Eddie burrows like a little hedgehog against her knees.

 

It’s Caitriona’s turn to dream.

 

She dreams of what she often does; the wrap party. It was the end of Season 4, and they’d known for a bit that they wouldn’t be renewed. But to be _there_ \- with the people she’d spent years with, it was akin to a funeral. So she had too much to drink and she got hot and flushed. Off came her sweater and she kept pushing the weight of her hair off her neck. 

 

When he yanked her into the corner, she had an inkling; of course she did. 

 

It had been building itself, brick by excruciating brick, for years and years. What seemed like decades. And really, it was _agony_. She wanted and wanted and wanted, until it was as if her body was no longer her own. He was always there, like hunger or the desire for light. And staring up at him, she didn’t know if she had it in her to remember Tony, or the fact that Sam was her _best friend -_ her very best, and if she lost him, she’d be lost too. 

 

He stared down at her. Her fists knotted behind her back by his hand, and she could feel him shaking just a little, soft vibrations that seemed to go through her like music. His eyes were huge and dark and wet; he was drunk and she was stupid.

 

"Christ, Cait," he breathed out.

 

"What," she said, (stupidly).

 

"Don't you--" he stopped, tugging her closer. Everything in her hurt. "Don't ye  _know_?"

 

"Sam, you're a bit pissed so--"

 

"Aye, but this isn't about that." He touched her face with his other hand. Brushed the backs of his fingers over her cheek. She felt every bump of his knuckles. "I need-- I need to kiss you."

 

"You've kissed me plenty."

 

His mouth quirked and his voice was low, gravelly. "I mean, I want to kiss ye as... as _Sam_."

 

Oh God. What could she say to that? Her whole body went sort of puddly, and he saw it happen, of course he did. Something lit his eyes - something like pure, masculine triumph, and he just-- did it. Kissed her.

 

Caitriona couldn't stop him and didn't want to, and it was _true_ , she felt the difference. It was Sam, not Jamie. It was hot and complicated, and he tasted of whisky. When he let go of her hands, she brought them to his shoulders, the nape of his neck. He wasn't wearing woolly plaid. His t-shirt was soft and worn against her palms. When his tongue touched hers, she jerked and moaned into his mouth.

 

"Oh fuck," she said, breaking away and staring up at him. "Anyone could've seen--"

 

"I dinna care, ye know." His accent was thickened by desire. "Come back wi' me tonight, Caitriona."

 

"Come... _back_ with you?" 

 

"Aye."

 

She blinked. "Are we in uni? Did I miss something?"

 

"Very funny." He took a step toward her. "Even funnier because I ken ye want to."

 

"It really doesn't matter if I do," she hissed. "I have a boyfriend for christ's sake. You know that."

 

"Who's a boring arsehole."

 

"He is _not_ \--"

 

"Go on, tell me how he makes ye laugh." Sam stared at her, pinning her in place. "Tell me how he knows all your secrets. Tell me about how he reads to you when you're too tired to even sleep after a shoot. Tell me how he kens exactly what soup ye like when you're sick. Tell me about how he supports ye, Caitriona. About how he cares about the things ye care about - because _you_ are so important to him. Tell me all about it-- I want to know about the notes he leaves for ye to make you giggle, or how on trips, he'll spend any amount of time searching for books of old poetry cause he kens how much you love them."

 

He softened, taking another step in her direction. "Tell me about how he makes ye come until you beg him to stop. About how he kisses ye every time he sees you, and in between too, because he can't help himself. Tell me that he's obsessed, that he kens he is, that hearing your voice is like... is like coming home for him. Tell me about how he dreams of you, and thinks about nothing else -- even when he knows he should be doing something with his time or working or going to the gym, he can't because his head is filled with Caitriona. Always, always _Caitriona_."

 

She was winded. Felt as if he'd punched her in her belly and her insides were spilling out, blood-red and insistent. She shook her head, unable to put anything into words, any of her thoughts that circled above them like crows. 

 

"You're my best mate," she said finally, quietly. It was a whisper, a cry. _Don't please don't, not now, not when you're drunk, when you might not remember tomorrow, when everything is ending. Everything I know is over. Everything we have known or done is over and I can't take another loss. I can't I can't I can't._ Those words sat beneath hers, unsaid. 

 

What had she really meant?

 

_I'm frightened. I'm frightened. I'm frightened._

_I love you._

 

His mouth twisted and he looked at her like he didn't know her. Like he never had.

 

It is that image that wrenches Caitriona back from her dreamworld, into waking. Her eyes open and immediately she feels the hot sting of salt, the tears that she wouldn't give in to earlier. 

 

It is his wedding day.

 

The clock on her mantel reads 11:00 am. 

 

She sits up, slowly, painfully. The tears slip down her cheeks, almost unnoticed. Next to the clock is a framed photo and she can't help herself. She walks toward it, each step like a bomb. The frame is silly; has elf ears and a pointy hat at the top. In it, she and Sam are posing at Matt's, during Christmas lunch. 

 

They have full plates in front of them, and are wearing the ridiculous crowns that come in Christmas crackers. He is in a navy hoodie, hair mussed, face flushed from wine and too much good food. She's tucked beneath his arm, wearing a cream sweater, hair loose and wavy, lips red. His crown is pink and hers green (she'd refused to switch). He's smiling big and so is he. They look-- _content._

 

She wonders for a moment, about her own blindness.

 

Her own, crushing loneliness.

 

And then her hand comes up, and she's grasping the frame, her fingers over their faces, their foolish smiles, and she throws it as hard as she can at the opposite wall. It crashes against the dove grey paint, the glass inside cracking and thundering. Eddie bolts from sleep and looks at her mistress with consternation -- before turning tail and racing into the bedroom. 

 

"I'm sorry Ed--" she calls, before dissolving into tears.

 

It is like that, really. Dissolving. Dismembering.

 

Because it's true. He's getting married.

 

He hasn't come back.

 

The frame lies on its side, one elf ear bent. Glass diamonds the floor, and she thinks about that party, her own inability to articulate her feelings, her own inability to _be true._

 

Until it was much, much too late.

 

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," she murmurs beneath her breath, sobbing now, hiccupy and trying to catch herself. "Right. Buck up, Balfe."

 

_A good cry lets the wild out._

She cleans up the mess she made, meticulously. Hoovers any stray shards. Puts the remains of the frame on her mantel again, face-down. When she's sure that no pieces of glass could ever harm her precious fur baby, she opens the bedroom door.

 

"Shower time," she says. Eddie looks up from licking her paws on the bed and stares at her contemptuously. "I know, my love. Mama's not having the best Christmas. But perhaps we'll order in some breakfast."

 

Her cat looks doubtful and Caitriona can't blame her, really. Shedding the sweater like a snake would its skin, she steps into the shower and with every scrub, washes away the smell of Sam. From her nipples, from her neck, from between her legs. She takes a breath with each soap bubble, slowly and gently calming herself down.

 

"He's getting married today," she tests out. A slight quiver to her lower lip, but she snares it with her teeth. "He's getting married today and you'll be okay. You'll... you'll be alone but you'll be okay."

 

And perhaps that's the crux of it.

 

Caitriona has spent so much of her life feeling like a nomad. Traveling. Working. Never settling, never finished, never content.

 

And then to find someone who you can sit with for hours - not saying a word - and still be perfectly, sweetly happy? That feeling of... _belonging?_ Of being understood? No matter the secret shames that might be hiding in your bones, or the reasons you hate yourself or the ways in which you've failed. No matter, because you've been _found._

And you... you've found too.

 

You've found the home you didn't even know had been missing at all.

 

Her heart bangs in her chest; a constant, questing drumbeat. She steps from the shower, wringing her hair out and singing under her breath, a little distraction. She puts on her best pajamas because why not. They are navy silk, like night shot through with starfall. Her hair she leaves damp and wavy down her back, and she picks Eddie up with one arm, wandering through to the living room.

 

“Shall we order our breakfast?”

 

Eddie replies, making a sound not unlike a train screeching into a station. 

 

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

 

Gluten-free blueberry pancakes with browned butter maple syrup, a bottle of prosecco, their homemade and cold pressed orange juice, and a side of unsweetened whipped cream for Ed. The website says 40 minutes due to high demand. Thank God she isn’t the only lazy - and cleaved in two? - person this Christmas morning.

 

They settle onto the couch. Caitriona stares at the ashes of the fire. The fire that he puttered around with; acting like a grandfather trying to work on an iPad. Everything in her squeezes, clenching down, down, down, trying to make this feeling as small as possible. But— _her_ Sam, marrying someone else.

 

She can picture it, actually.

 

She doesn’t want to, but she _can_.

 

He’s standing at the front of a small church. It’s quiet and bible-black, but for the lit candles on the window sills and at the altar. His suit is the darkest grey, more of a charcoal, and it fits him _just so._ A white button-down beneath it, and tie with a subtle plaid. A seductive and simple nod to his heritage.

 

She watches him watch the bride.

 

She watches, and the woman walks toward him, on the arm of no one - clutching peonies and baby’s breath, her dress as white as snow and just as unspoiled. Try as she might, Caitriona can’t make out her face. It’s a blur, like a child’s painting. 

 

Is it because she can’t picture anyone else marrying him?

 

Anyone else but her?

 

And yes, she can see herself there. But the church is in Scotland. She wishes that it was in Ireland, but no… it’s Scotland. Where they truly, truly _met_. Where they stared at Lochs and instagrammed pics and ate cupcakes and walked up hills and played lovers and touched standing stones and drank wine in smoky pubs and _fell in love._

Tumbled into it. 

 

Ran headlong into it, like fools.

 

Like someone bounding in front of a speeding car or lorry.

 

Heedless, damaging, resplendent, perfect in all of its imperfections and bloody, raw, tender necessity. 

 

She swipes at her face, angered again by her own tears, and hears knocks at the door. Her breakfast, early and thank Christ for it. Eddie jumps off her lap and swishes her tail in disgust at the interruption.

 

"You'll be happy when you've got your cream, poppet," Caitriona says, amused and salt-ridden and weary. She scrubs at her eyes again and unwraps herself from the couch, walking down the hall.

 

When she opens the door, her breath hitches and she feels the cracks in her heart, like a river thawing after a long, long winter. 

 

"Forget something?" she asks, trying to be casual, but her voice breaks and she's so embarrassed that a blush blooms in her cheeks.

 

"Aye."

 

Sam considers her for a moment and then steps forward, touching her face gently, reverently.

 

"I forgot you, Caitriona."


	5. midnight.

Outside, the wind howls, a relentless, beautiful cry. 

 

Inside, it is hushed, snowbound and very, very still. Caitriona wakes, the bed warm and Eddie’s paw against her hair. She was dreaming in the dark of a morning exactly one year ago, of a dawn that broke across a glowing sky.

 

She was dreaming of the day of Sam's wedding, and the memory catches her breath, like a hook beneath her ribs. Caitriona lies back against the velvet pillows, her heart juddering beneath her breasts. Funny, that the memory still has the force of a speeding train, or a plane, arcing toward an unforgivable earth.

 

She remembers it like she remembers secret things. Things that speak directly to the jewel of her heart, like a ruby, glistening red and as fragile as the wing of a bird. 

 

How he touched her face. As if he was memorizing the way she looked, standing there, in pajamas, waiting.

 

His voice.  "I forgot you, Caitriona."

 

"What does that mean?"

 

A ghost of a half smile appeared on his lips. Sam brushed his knuckles down her cheek, down to her chin. His thumb and forefinger brought her face up ever so slightly. 

 

"What do ye think it means?"

 

She shook, unsure and hardly daring to believe. "Are you getting married today?"

 

Sam brought her close, enfolding her in his arms. She couldn't raise her own to embrace him, she couldn't move, she felt like a frozen tree in the forest, ribboned with ice. Immovable. Her heart raged in her chest.

 

And his whisper undid her.

 

"No, Balfe. I'm not."

 

Only then did she hug him. But it was more than that. It was as if something opened inside of her, shifted and began to wail. With a feeling akin to horror, Caitriona realized the sounds she could hear were from _her_ \- sobs that seemed to break her apart, sobs of such titanic _relief_ that her eyes were dry. She couldn't even make salt, she couldn't stop, she couldn't do anything but hold onto him and face how close she'd come to the lip of the avalanche.

 

"Shhhh," he murmured, gathering her up and cradling her.

 

He carried her like that, in his embrace, to the couch. Cuddled her on his lap and said nothing, just gave her his strength as the icy riverbed of her life - her heart, her skin, her body, her muscles, her loneliness - it cracked like thunder, letting water rush, letting the swollen eddies free, the fish swim, the blossoms bloom.

 

"You left," she said quietly, against his neck, now wet with tears.

 

"I know and I'm sorry," he said. "Ye shocked the hell out of me."

 

"Didn't you _know_?"

 

Sam tipped her face up so he could stare into her eyes. She knew they were big as pie-plates, red and damp. His voice was low and rough.

 

"Only hoped."

 

She scrubbed her hands over her face. "I feel a right idiot, acting like this."

 

He chuckled. "Then ye should have seen me the past few hours."

 

"Was it very bad?"

 

"Bad?" he considered. "Do ye want to hear about it?"

 

"I don't know." Suddenly she couldn't look at him. "I don't even know what any of this means."

 

"What do ye think it means?"

 

"You keep asking me that."

 

"And ye keep avoiding answering."

 

"I'm not _avoiding_ it," she said, just as the doorbell rang. She hadn't been so absurdly grateful for an interruption since the fondue. God, had that only been yesterday? Her brain felt hot and confused, as if by sobbing in his arms, she'd somehow transformed herself. Like a strange alchemy. "But that's my breakfast."

 

"Aye, I'm a bit hungry."

 

"I didn't order anything for you."

 

"Can't ye share?"

 

He looked so forlorn that she laughed, climbing from his arms. "Maybe. If I feel like it."

 

After she paid the driver and made a quick pit stop to splash cold water on her face, she went into the kitchen to watch him. Of course she got plates and fussed a bit, but she couldn't help it - she was starving for the sight of him. He was knelt by the fire, painstakingly rebuilding what had gone out in his absence. He rolled bits of newspaper, arranged logs, poked around at the embers. When the match lit, it made a _fitzzz_ sound not unlike champagne popping. And then the _whooomphhh_ of the flames catching, beginning to devour the wood, the kindling, the air itself.

 

"Fancy a mimosa?" she asked, her throat full just from that. Just from watching him in her space. Watching him and somehow knowing - without any proof _oh god, be careful Caitriona_ \- that he wouldn't be leaving again.

 

"Go ahead then."

 

She dragged a cut-glass pitcher from the back of one of her cupboards and emptied the Prosecco in one fell swoop. The orange juice was cold-pressed, pulpy and perfectly delicious. She poured it in swirls over the chilled sparkling wine, watching the skeins descend like stripes of sunlight. 

 

Thankfully - for Sam's stomach anyway - the order of pancakes was ridiculously large, and she portioned them out onto two plates, sticking them in the oven to keep warm as she heated up their brown butter maple syrup.

 

All the while, she watched him.

 

He had changed. Into slim khaki pants, belted at the waist. A button-down black shirt tucked in, and a slouchy cardigan, with white piping at its hems. It was as if he had dressed up, and her belly squeezed in on itself as she wondered -- had he gone home to change? Had he told her then?

 

Or if not at home, where?

 

He was playing with Eddie on the rug in front of the fire. Normally Ed couldn't be bothered with rolls of yarn or things shaped like mice, but she was being amiable enough. Of course, what she really wanted to do was climb onto Sam's chest and plant herself like a sentinel but he couldn't know that.

 

Would he learn her ways, like Caitriona had?

 

Would he be _here_ to learn them?

 

"Breakfast," she said around the sting at the back of her mouth. The sting of tears - hopeful, questing, wondering, hungry tears. They wanted to _know_ and so did she, but she was oh so very, very frightened.

 

They ate facing each other. Caitriona sat cross-legged on her armchair by the tree. Sam on the couch. She got about midway through a pancake before giving up. 

 

"Full already?"

 

"Just nervous," she admitted, setting the plate on the window sill.

 

She sipped her mimosa, feeling the bubbles fill her mouth, the rich explosions of fruit, the acidity meeting the sweet. Eddie licked at the bowl of whipped cream with an expression of nirvana. And Sam cleaned his plate - _boys_ \- before settling back, patting his belly with pride.

 

"Those were --"

 

"Gluten free and quite healthy actually," she said quickly.

 

"Don't spoil it, Balfe."

 

She giggled, quirking an eyebrow. "So are you going to start talking or...?"

 

"I thought it was you who we established was avoiding the questions."

 

"Not now."

 

"It's quite daunting, I 'spose... I dinna ken what to say really."

 

"It's been a weird two days."

 

Sam laughed out loud and cocked his head. "Bloody understatement if I've ever heard one."

 

“Like ripping off a plaster,” she said. “When did you tell her?”

 

He swallowed audibly. “About… an hour or so ago?”

 

“How did it go?”

 

“About as you’d expect.”

 

“I didn’t have any expectations.”

 

“Didn’t ye?”

 

“Not of that.”

 

“What have ye been doing since—“

 

“Throwing a party. I just finished clearing up.”

 

“ _Balfe_.”

 

She shot him a withering look. “What kind of twatty question is that? What do you _think?”_  


"Aye." He paused. "But sometimes it's nice to hear it."

 

"Oh." It was her turn to hesitate. "Can you answer me first, please?"

 

"Since ye asked so politely." He grinned and tossed back the mimosa. "It didna go well... I mean, we weren't ... it wasn't what I thought I'd go into a marriage feeling but it was still going to be her wedding day. She threw a lot of things I'd bought her in the general direction of my head. She shouted a fair bit. I feel like a shite, as I should. But I think she'll be happier in the long run. She deserves better."

 

"And so do you," Cait said softly.

 

"Aye, I think so. At least I deserve to feel like I did when I saw ye on the street yesterday afternoon."

 

Her breath hitched. "Tell me."

 

"Ye walked straight past me, actually," he said, a small smile alighting on his lips, like a firefly. "I was just coming out of that sushi place we went to once with the--"

 

"Extra hot wasabi?"

 

"Right. So I felt like a git but I followed you, because I couldn't believe ye didn't even see me. I just-- yer hair was so long, and ye looked so in your own mind? It was like the city didn't exist. It was just you and your own thoughts. I felt -- knocked for six, if I'm being honest. Obviously you're beautiful, Caitriona -- but it was like I was seeing ye after a long sleep. It was like discovering ye all over again. I couldn't _not_ go into that book store. I think -- I think I knew what would happen but I didn't even care. I ken that makes me the bastard in this situation."

 

"A little," she admitted, her throat hurting. "But an incurable romantic all the same, Heughan."

 

"Only when it comes to you, it seems," he said quietly. "Do ye know I've loved you since--"

 

"Don't," she whispered, the tears insistent in her mouth, hot and stinging.

 

"Why not?" his voice was gentle. "If not today, when?"

 

"I don't want to cry again."

 

"Come here."

 

"No."

 

"Come here, Balfe."

 

She did. Sat cross-legged next to him and he moved a bit, so he was facing her. His large, warm hand covered hers, and she felt a peculiar crashing inside, like an electric shock, but deeper. His fingers curled around her palm and he squeezed. Reassuring her, as he had always done - and she him - before interviews, press junkets, difficult scenes - having each other's backs, always. 

 

It was such a foreign sensation after a year without, and yet, as familiar to Caitriona as the feel of her own skin.

 

Sam breathed out and regarded her. "Why do ye think I was getting married?"

 

"Usually love comes into it--"

 

"No. It wasn't that."

 

She could feel her lower lip trembling and bit down fiercely. She tasted copper pennies on her tongue, as bright and vivid as a kiss. "I don't know."

 

_But she did._

"Because I thought ye didn't want me." He shrugged, the casual movement hiding a wealth of sadness. "So I knew I wouldn't ever have-- _that_. I thought I might as well try to ease the loneliness, I 'spose."

 

"That's a terrible reason."

 

"Aye, I ken that _now_ ," he said, chucking her chin. "Smart arse."

 

"Well that makes two of us, doesn't it."

 

"I didn't love her."

 

The statement, so bald and brave and _present -_ it felled her for a moment. She felt like a fish on a hook, wriggling. How to get away from that kind of nakedness? When she had been placing battlements around her body and heart and mind for over a year? Longer?

 

"I'm glad." She said it before wisdom could take root and stop her. "I know that makes me the bastard now but--"

 

"Why didn't ye come back with me after the party?" he asked.

 

"I was in a relationship."

 

"That's not why."

 

"I was terrified," she said in a rush. "I was terrified that you'd regret it in the morning and I'd lose not only the show, but my best mate as well."

 

"As it turns out, that happened anyway."

 

She pressed her hand over the throb of her heart. "I missed you."

 

Sam smiled then and pulled her a bit, turning her so that she could lie with her head on his lap, pushed against the crook of his elbow. He stroked her hair away from her forehead. 

 

"I missed you too. Thought you'd never speak to me again."

 

"I didn't know what to say," she admitted. "I mean, clearly. And then it just got... well, it felt awkward. Like it had been too long?"

 

"It would never be too long, Caitriona."

 

They both looked at each other and then in unison, "That's what she said."

 

As they laughed, she felt her heart swell, a new alchemy. His hand on her head, massaging her scalp just the way she liked. His cardigan against her cheek, warm and soft and smelling of him; sandalwood and boy and winter. Eddie at her feet, licking her paws. The fire crackling, spitting, casting a burnished golden glow. The flat looked different somehow. 

 

Another alchemy.

 

His laughter broke into a yawn. "Och, I'm exhausted."

 

"Not surprising. Haven't you been up since.... yesterday morning?"

 

"Aye, spent since dawn wandering." He grinned self-consciously. "Had to go an' change, I was soaked through. Looked a sight."

 

"Wandering?"

 

"Didn't know what else to do. I had to think." 

 

"I'm sorry that I--"

 

He placed a finger over her lips gently. "Dinna ever be sorry for that. I've waited six years to hear ye say that, Balfe."

 

"I've waited six years to say it."

 

Sam gathered her up and nuzzled her nose with his. She sighed with contentment at the feel of him, looping her arms around his neck and sinking into the kiss. His palms rubbed down her back, up beneath the silk of her pajama top, to touch the lines of her spine, the dips of her waist, the curve of her lower back. 

 

He whispered against her lips, "I didn't have to think about you, if that wasn't clear."

 

"Sorry?" she asked, muddled by the kiss, by the taste of him.

 

"It wasn't a question, is what I mean." He kissed her again, his mouth flush with hers, hungry and wanting. "I just had to think about -- well, how to go about calling it off. It sounds so -- terrible when I put it that way... but it was never about whether to come back here. To you. That was never... I knew I would from the moment I saw ye on the street yesterday. And so I walked for hours in the snow and I felt bloody miserable to be quite honest-- just wondering how to break the news. How to -- _do_ something so awful, in the best possible way."

 

"And did you?" she murmured.

 

"Christ, no. I did it all wrong. I said the wrong things. I was an idiot."

 

"What else is new, I suppose," she kissed him to soothe the sting. "We've both been a pair of idiots when you think about it."

 

"Well you less than me," he said, moving her so she straddled his waist. "I got engaged. At least you broke up with Tony before anything foolish happened."

 

Caitriona traced his eyebrows with the pads of her thumbs. "You _could_ look it at that way. Or you could say I dated the wrong guy. For years..."

 

"Aye, let's blame you."

 

She bopped his nose. "Now who's a smart arse?"

 

"That's why ye love me though."

 

He looked up at her, his eyes shining, and she leaned down to meet him, her answering kiss like a troth, a promise kept.

 

_That's why ye love me though._

 

Those words echo through Caitriona as she lies in bed, one year later, and remembers the timbre of his voice when he said them. Hopeful, rough with desire, ardent. His accent thickened. His arms tightening around her waist. And the way they kissed, as if they'd never, ever stop. 

 

Rolling over, she stares at the empty bed. Eddie stretched out, like a queen, snoring loudly.

 

Cait gets up, walking over to the window. Outside, the snow is as white as doves, and falls with ever increasing intensity. New York is blanketed by diamonds, still and unmoving. Lampposts the only glow in the endless night. She peers through the glass, wondering if she'll hear the bells of the White Witch's sleigh, see the Faun and Lucy, scurrying through the trees. Aslan's roar, and the awful stone gallery, animals and dragons and giants in the rictus of between death and wake.

 

Their transformation when the sun finally split the clouds.  

 

Her breath puffs the glass and she traces an "S" in the fog.

 

"Oh my God, Balfe," she whispers and smears the glass with her fingers.

 

Tugging on a robe and padding out of the room, she can't help but smile when she sees the fire roaring. The flat is as cozy as it's ever been; her tree glowing with hundreds of tiny white lights. 

 

Sam is knelt in front of it, arranging something out of her eye sight.

 

"Sexy Santa," she says to his back.

 

"Christ!" he shrieks (she didn't even know he _could_ shriek) and jumps up, whirling to face her. He's dressed only in boxer briefs, and his hair is wild from sleep. "You scared the fuck out of me --"

 

"Perhaps you shouldn't be sneaking around," she says sweetly. "What are you doing?"

 

"Wrapping your gift," he says, glaring at her. "I forgot."

 

"How romantic." She pauses. "Are you finished?"

 

"Just. I wouldn't be half surprised if I've torn the wrapping what with ye skulking around the flat--"

 

"You're right. I'm so sorry for walking around in my own apartment."

 

He scowls. "It's mine too."

 

Caitriona finally breaks; she can't help it. Overcome with giggles, she walks over and wraps her arms around his neck. "Stop sulking, Scrooge. Aren't you going to wish me Merry Christmas?"

 

"It's the middle of the bloody night," he says through clenched teeth. "And ye scared me so much my balls have actually gone up inside my body."

 

"Oooh, poor baby," she murmurs, standing on her tip-toes and kissing his mouth. "Perhaps I can help with that?"

 

He perks up. "Oh, aye?"

 

"Aye," she mimics and slips her hand down beneath his waistband. "Unless you're still too annoyed?"

 

"I'll get over it," he chuckles and lowers her down in front of the fire. "What're you doing up, babe?"

 

She makes a sound low in her throat when he pulls off in her robe, baring her to him. "Had a dream."

 

"About?"

 

"Can't remember," she says, already quivering. "I want it slow."

 

He grins and bends his head to her breasts, but Cait drags him back up. 

 

“No.”

 

“Wh—“

 

“Fuck me now, but fuck me slow.”

 

Sam swallows. She can see his throat working and she opens her legs. 

 

“Are ye sure you’re—“

 

“I’ve been wet since I woke up from dreaming of you."

 

He growls and hooks his thumbs behind her knees, lifting them slightly so he can feed himself into her. She moans as he goes in, inch by inch, his cock feeling impossibly hard and thick and hot. Once he’s rooted to the base, he balances on his elbows and dips his head, kissing her briefly, his tongue licking her bottom lip.

 

He stays still for a moment, and Caitriona squirms, feeling impaled and desperate. Her legs clench around his back and she cups his face, bringing him in so she can snare his mouth with her teeth. He hisses and bucks against her, finally moving, but slowly - so slowly - just as she asked. 

 

She can hear the sound of his cock as it goes in and out; a wet sound, she’s so wet she’s dripping with it - and the sound of his belly meeting hers, the rasp of his pubic hair against her clit. He works his pelvis against her, grinding the bone into her pussy until she’s strung tight as a bow, feeling his one palm grasp her breasts, pushing them together and flicking her nipples. She gasps, the feeling not unlike pain, so close to it that it’s unbearable, and she comes around him, crying out, keening his name.

 

And still he fucks her, relentlessly, his forehead damp with sweat, the hair at the nape of his neck curling with it, and she reaches up, wipes it off and smears it over her breasts. It is elemental - as primal as the days of mud huts and wild animal eyes glinting in the darkness - and he groans out loud, leaning down to suck her nipples into his mouth. 

 

Caitriona comes again, deeper this time - it travels from her nipples and branches like lightning down her thighs. As if everything in her is being dismantled and disassembled. She can do nothing - not even scream - her eyes watering with tears and her body answering his, moving, fucking back, taking him and her orgasm and his orgasm, taking them down into herself, where she is pink and raw and wild. And _oh,_ the drives of his dick, so deep that it’s as if he’s _marking_ her, burning her up until she’s nothing but ash. 

 

Later, they drag themselves away from the fire and back to bed, drowsy and warm and sated.

 

"Merry Christmas, Balfe," he whispers against her hair.

 

"Shouldn't that be 'Mrs. Heughan'?" she says teasingly, snuggling back against him. 

 

He wraps his arm around her front, pulling her even closer. "Aye on paper perhaps."

 

"But in your heart?"

 

"Always be Balfe to me," he says, snuffling peacefully, on the brink of sleep, of dreams.

 

She thinks of the gift she'll give him tomorrow -- well, in a couple of hours -- the little shoes, so small, so precious and perfect. They had been ridiculously expensive of course, but she hadn't been able to resist.

 

His hand rests on her belly, as if he knows - somewhere, deep down inside of himself, where the secrets are. Where their hearts are brave, and beautiful and speak their truths, finally their truths. She thinks again of the frozen river, the ice splitting, 

 

the water fighting its way out, battling.

 

The bones of winter flowing from within the depths, traveling toward spring. 

 

 

_Finis_


End file.
